NEWS
20 March 2023
Massachusetts Gaming Commission holds hearing on illegal bets taken at Plainridge Park Casino
By Gambling Insider

The state of Massachusetts does not allow for sports wagers to be made on college sports teams.

On 2 February, Plainridge Park Casino mistakenly offered wagering on unauthorised games. The specific basketball game was between the Long Island University Sharks and Merrimack Warriors.

Wagering was allowed for seven hours on this game. Approximately $6,848 in total was wagered on the game, with approximately $4,270 allocated in total to patron winnings.

There were a total of 33 bets across 27 tickets, with one ticket holding seven distinct wagers on it.

All of the bets have been settled, either in full or in accordance with in-house rules regarding refunding unauthorised game wagers.

Four of the unauthorised wagers were taken at cashier desks, with the remainder made at independent kiosks.

The error was made because Kambi, the sports betting technology provider, was responsible for coding against Massachusetts college games.

However, on this occasion, the Merrimack team was listed as being based in Florida, rather than Massachusetts.

Kambi reported that it was notified of the error on 3 February at 12:15 pm, and the team fixed the error within 10 minutes.

Kambi reviewed it afterwards and found that Merrimack was the only team in error.

A full investigation followed this and no suspicious betting activity was found regarding the men's college basketball games.

In response to the error, Kambi has created a manual blacklist for college teams in Massachusetts, which will prevent any further mistakes from using the automatic filter.